do we finally have a free blu-ray media player?

Happy Hopping

Happy Hopping

Supreme [H]ardness
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I only have a blu ray player on my PC, I'm not going to buy a blu-ray player. When on earth will we get a free blu-ray media player?
 
I don't think so. I'm in the market for buying some Blu-Ray player software, since PowerDVD 8 BD edition which came with my drive is a p.o.s.
Any suggestions as to what to get?
 
Your only legitimate solution is to rip the content from the disc to the hard drive, as there is still no actual "free" media player that will play a Blu-ray disc in a Blu-ray reader or even a burner.

You can use MakeMKV to rip the Blu-ray, all of it, to a single file on the hard drive and watch it with something like Media Player Classic Home Cinema, but you still aren't going to find anything that can play a Blu-ray disc while it's in the drive (watching natively).

Aside from that, it's either Intervideo WinDVD with Blu-ray playback capability, Arcsoft Total Media Theater, or Cyberlink PowerDVD for commercial Blu-ray playback software. Most Blu-ray drives for PCs do come with a version of one of those packages so you can make use of the drive...
 
I would be so annoyed if I bought a BluRay drive for my PC and found out I couldn't play BluRay movies without having to pay for a separate program!

I hadn't heard of DAPlayer, thanks Enigma. I wonder if it has good slow motion? Slow motion + HD video is cool.
 
I finally get this to work. But do you guys get Dolby Digital 5.1? I have a integrated amp. that I connect the sound card output to the rear of the integrated amp. thru 1 analog cable. The sound card is the embedded sound card on the motherboard. The integrated amp. connects to 5.1 speakers. I have the realtek manager so far to set at virtual surround, is that the best I can do? What did you guys do on your audio?

and is there a way to disable the sub-title? As the "Disable sub-title" option is grey out

also, I notice the background sound is quite loud, but the human audio doesn't seem to be as loud. And if I increase the vol., then the human audio is good but background sound effect would become too loud. Is there a way to fix that?
 
Last edited:
Joe Average said:
Your only legitimate solution is to rip the content from the disc to the hard drive, as there is still no actual "free" media player that will play a Blu-ray disc in a Blu-ray reader or even a burner.

You can use MakeMKV to rip the Blu-ray, all of it, to a single file on the hard drive and watch it with something like Media Player Classic Home Cinema, but you still aren't going to find anything that can play a Blu-ray disc while it's in the drive (watching natively).

Aside from that, it's either Intervideo WinDVD with Blu-ray playback capability, Arcsoft Total Media Theater, or Cyberlink PowerDVD for commercial Blu-ray playback software. Most Blu-ray drives for PCs do come with a version of one of those packages so you can make use of the drive...
Click to expand...

Hmm, I am able to insert a BluRay, browse my drive to the STREAM folder from my BluRay drive and play the .mt2s file directly in Media Player Classic Home Cinema.

No ripping or converting necessary.
 
gibber said:
I would be so annoyed if I bought a BluRay drive for my PC and found out I couldn't play BluRay movies without having to pay for a separate program!
Click to expand...

Wasn't it the same way with DVD drives until Microsoft started bundling MPEG2 codecs with the Home Premium/Ultimate editions of Vista?

Though, you usually lucked out with bundled software (e.g. PowerDVD or WinDVD) if you bought the drive from retail. Don't know if that's the same with blu-ray drives.
 
I just use AnyDVD HD + BluRay.

It decrypts real time; as far as the rest of the software on your PC is concerned, you've inserted an unencrypted and unprotected disc. This allows playback in more media players and on displays that don't pass HDCP (like if you have to use Component video on an older HDTV). This software basically saved me from replacing an otherwise perfect 42" plasma TV :D
 
SirMaster said:
Hmm, I am able to insert a BluRay, browse my drive to the STREAM folder from my BluRay drive and play the .mt2s file directly in Media Player Classic Home Cinema.

No ripping or converting necessary.
Click to expand...

it says cannot render files when I try it
 
I've installed both AnyDVD HD and Power DVD 10 Ultra II on a friend laptop that has BluRay Rom, but after I found AnyDVD doesn't play BluRay or as somebody pointed out it decrypts real time than provide playback. So I didn't see point to keep it and just left PowerDVD, which seems to do the job well so far.
 
Happy Hopping said:
I finally get this to work. But do you guys get Dolby Digital 5.1? I have a integrated amp. that I connect the sound card output to the rear of the integrated amp. thru 1 analog cable. The sound card is the embedded sound card on the motherboard. The integrated amp. connects to 5.1 speakers. I have the realtek manager so far to set at virtual surround, is that the best I can do? What did you guys do on your audio?

and is there a way to disable the sub-title? As the "Disable sub-title" option is grey out

also, I notice the background sound is quite loud, but the human audio doesn't seem to be as loud. And if I increase the vol., then the human audio is good but background sound effect would become too loud. Is there a way to fix that?
Click to expand...

A single analog cable is stereo only. If you want DD5.1 audio, get a sound card that has a digital output (optical or coaxial). Both work, depends on the type of inputs your amp accepts.
 
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